My first contact with vulgarities came when I was just a tiny kid in primary school. The vulgarities at that time, also known as "bad words", took on a totally new meaning as compared to the vulgarities of today, the ones that cool people like you use on people like me. Anything out of the norm then could be considered a "bad word", such as "cockroach", "shit", "bastard", and even "watermelon". Yea "watermelon". That was the first "bad word" I ever learnt in my life, if it could even be considered one. I remember vividly the name of the guy who polluted my mind right from day one of my primary school days, an Indian boy named Nicholas Lim (real name was not used to protect his identity). Here's what happened:

Me: "Why the teacher so long haben come yet?"
The teacher steps into class right at this time.
Him: "Dere the watermelon come orleady."
Someone else: "Or hor! Teacher, he call you watermelon!"

No prizes for guessing what happened next. His butt and his face looked resembled each other at the end of the day. Though she did indeed look like one, I didn't think she needed the reminders.

Of course, "bad words" became more and more widely used, but still deemed unacceptable in primary schools, so you get assholes who go around trying to sabo others into saying out these "bad words" out loud.

Boy: "Eh, bus 'first', bus 'second', then bus what?"
Me: "Bus 'third'!"
Boy: "Or hor! Say bad word! I go tell teacher."

I ggxx-ed after that. However, this never happened more than once or twice, because the primary school students became more streetwise, and started to come up with ways to get pass this hurdle.

Boy: "Eh, bus 'first', bus 'second', then bus what?"
Me: "Example only ah, example ah, bus 'third'."
Boy: "!!!" (runs away crying)

Great success! Once bitten, twice shy. Never was I going to fall for the same trap set by these idiots again. The words "example only ah" was so powerful, the people who used them gained utmost respect from their other peers. In fact, it proved as a talisman to ward off the teachers, because they could never be able to catch you saying vulgarities intentionally, especially when I always manage to out-talk them.

Teacher: "Eh Ernest why you say bad word!"
Me: "No it's example only! I just telling him what it means, but I never scold anyone. Example only!"
Teacher: "Ok then"

But then, everyone started using those three magic words so much, that the effects wore off soon enough. To hell with "example only ah", we now go for the real thing, which brings us to secondary school days.

RI, the land of vulgarities, it was here that the true purpose of the English Language was fully realised, and it was where we fully understood the Hokkien, Cantonese and Teochew cultures as well. Vulgarities were so rampant, you could hardly catch a sentence with a single sense of decency in it.

*Disclaimer* Since the blog should reflect what the owner of the blog is like, all vulgarites below are censored, since the owner is also vulgarity-free.

Anonymous: "Eh he damn bas**** leh, damn fuc*** you know, so much fuc**** sh** lot of homework. Fu** it, I'm not going to fuc**** doing it. Fuc*. KNN."

So basically, you hear so much of the same words everyday, your vocabulary has essentially been reduced to only less than 10 words, probably more if you had some PRC scholars in your class who taught you the legendary 36 vulgarities from dunno some sect in China.

In RJ, the number of vulgarities uttered by both guys and girls declined sharply unsurprisingly. For once, you're sucked back into civilisation once again, and actually hear more than 5 decent words in a row. Why is that? No one wants to turn off members of the other gender, that's why. That was only during J1 though, because no one gives a shit these days anymore, it's not worth it, heh, but that doesn't mean I'm doing it though :).